One of the elements of Ontario Conservative leader Tim Hudak’s provocative white paper on labour reform that did not receive a lot of attention when he released it last week was its pledge to force unions, by law, to “provide full and transparent disclosure of their revenues and how they spend their funds.”

There is certainly an element of payback in this proposal. The Ontario PCs have for years been subjected to expensive attack ad campaigns bankrolled by unions, and the party just this week lost a court battle to have the Working Families coalition of unions, which spent more than $2-million on anti-Hudak ads during the last election, declared a Liberal front.

But, in the short term at least, the Progressive Conservatives stand to benefit greatly from the thing they are trying to change, as the province’s labour movement dips into its deep well of advertising money and takes the fight to, of all people, Premier Dalton McGuinty.

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Various groups representing the province’s doctors have already begun the air war, buying ad time to decry the Liberal decision to unilaterally reduce a host of fees paid to physicians and certain specialists. Kitchener-Waterloo, site of a crucial byelection expected this fall, is among the markets targeted by the Ontario Medical Association in a campaign that, among other things, accuses the Premier of “making it harder to find a doctor for my kids.” And, with speculation swirling that the province will seek to impose a framework labour deal on some of the largest teachers unions, at least one of them has warned members that it will “continue to oppose by all appropriate means interference in the collective bargaining process.” An ad campaign, funded by those same Working Families unions, would not be far behind.

The objective is to make the public aware of the impact these cuts will have on them

Considering that Mr. McGuinty rarely makes a speech without stressing the primacy of health and education among his priorities, it’s a peculiar thing to see him the subject of a PR carpet bombing from those sectors. But it’s happening. One radio ad, paid for by the Ontario Association of Radiologists, says, “clearly Premier McGuinty wants to bring U.S.-style health care to Canada.” Dalton McGuinty as the U.S. health care bogeyman? Are we sure the sun is still setting in the west?

The OMA’s ads are comparatively muted, although the radio version does use the sound effect of a heart-rate monitor flatlining to provide a little drama, but the goal is the same: to force the government to back down on some of the medical fee cuts that it says will save more than $330-million a year.

“The objective is to make the public aware of the impact these cuts will have on them,” Dr. Douglas Weir, president of the OMA, said in an interview. The public, he hopes, will then pressure their MPPs to have at least some of the changes undone.

Dr. Weir acknowledged that waging a campaign against the Liberals is a stark change from a relationship that has been largely amiable during Mr. McGuinty’s eight years in power.

But, he said, when the government decided to implement the fee changes unilaterally in the spring, “it was clear we would have to get our message out.” He said such a campaign is necessary “if the government is going to take this heavy-handed approach.”

The government’s response to the criticism has remained unchanged since the changes were imposed in May: “We’re making changes to fees for physician services to reflect advances in technology and the latest medical evidence on what helps patients most,” Health Minister Deb Matthews said then, and continues to do so.

But the question is whether Mr. McGuinty is prepared to weather the storm. The PR blitz is far from genteel, borrowing tricks common in the nastiest of election ads. One of the radiologists’ radio spots intones that Ms. Matthews is “slashing funding for critical diagnostic tests” that save lives. Then it plays a clip of her saying, out of context, “I had to make some trade-offs.” The spot says she has squandered millions on the Ornge scandal — ouch — and ends with the narrator asking “How can she trade off patient lives so easily?”

If it’s true that the Working Families ads severely hurt Mr. Hudak and the PCs in the fall election, then it follows that the Liberals must fear a similar pummeling from these summer campaigns. And in Kitchener-Waterloo, where the Liberals hope to regain a long-time Tory seat vacated by Elizabeth Witmer, the chance to regain an effective majority in the legislature would suffer from attacks from doctors and, possibly, teachers.

The Liberals offered a minor climb down on one element of their May plan this week, delaying the reduction of “self-referral” fees and sending the issue to a panel for further discussion. Dr. Weir said it’s a sign the government has realized it has overreached.

“It’s never too late to go back and revisit,” he said.

But the government is committed to what it calls its Strong Action plan to fight the deficit, which includes real wage freezes, including on doctors and teachers. Ad campaigns or no, it can’t afford to look weak.

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